


Breaking the Silence

by WinterRoseQueen



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, sansan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-18
Updated: 2015-08-20
Packaged: 2018-04-15 09:00:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4600860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WinterRoseQueen/pseuds/WinterRoseQueen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sansa is curious about her new shadow, and finds that a companion is not unwelcome. Sandor answers simple questions with more meaning than she ever expected.</p><p>EDITED 7/28/17</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Answers

**Author's Note:**

> As you can see, summaries are not my forte. Maybe it's a little ooc, maybe it's not. I wrote this a very long time ago, and finally got around to posting it.

 "You-" Joffrey had said, pointing to the Hound. "I want you to be Lady Sansa's new dog."

Sandor Clegane made an indifferent noise in response. Joffrey fixed his cruel, narrowed eyes on Sansa and sneered. The only reason Joffrey ordered this was because he knew of her immense fright. The eyes of the court shifted uneasily as one. She bowed her head.

 

Everywhere she went, the Hound would follow. That was his only task now, and his disposition remained as sullen as stone. She was alone only when she returned to her chambers each night, and it was a blessing to be without a silent, brooding shadow.

For a few weeks Sansa hardly dared to glance at him. If the Hound saw fear in her eyes he would seethe with rage for a day or two, often making cruel comments until she met his gaze again, her face forcibly blank. She would attenpt to focus on the intact half of his face, but sometimes her eyes betrayed her and would flick back to the burns. Red, terrible, cruel; yet as when he first told her the story of their making, fear gave way to a heavy sadness. After he drank his fill of her gaze he would seem to grow bored, or at least the ire would drain from the storm of his eyes, and he would turn away. She almost sighed in relief each time.

 

Silence has a way of growing weary, and so one afternoon she decided to speak. "Do you grow bored of following me?" Sansa asked tentatively. Her thought was that perhaps if she was considerate of his equal unwillingness in the arrangement, he would be kinder. He offered only a vaguely curious look, and she stayed quiet for the rest of the day.

Days following were the same. She would find the courage to ask a question or make a remark about something as simple as the weather, and he'd give the same indifferent look.

"Do you mind being called 'The Hound?'" Sansa asked, feeling particularly daring after being beaten down by the king's knights for so long. Or maybe it was frustration. He made a noise between a snort and a growl, and she stopped mid-step, so suddenly he nearly ran into her.

"Have you forgotten how to speak?" Sansa burst out, gritting her teeth at the sheer loneliness of seemingly speaking to air. Her tone was much less biting than she wished it, and she wondered if he would criticize her for it. Sansa almost hoped he would.

"No," he replied flatly. She sighed and continued walking.

"Well, I suppose you only speak when you're insulting me," Sansa told him.

Then he spoke so softly she nearly mistook it for the scuff of their feet. Sansa stopped again, whirling around this time. Her shock and confusion wiped away any reaction to his appearance.

"What?" Sansa asked, mouth slightly open. For a moment she thought she imagined it. An apology.

"I said nothing," he told her roughly, as if daring her to ask him to repeat his words. Sansa remained bewildered, gaping at him with no sense of courtesy for once. She knew exactly what he had said, even if it didn’t make sense. An apology.

He was watching Sansa closely, searching for disgust in her expression. Sansa realized as he did that there wasn't any, and for the first time she truly registered his features. The unburnt side was not so terrible to look upon. He had sharp cheekbones and a defined jaw, with gray eyes that suddenly seemed softer than their usual cool slate. With surprise she noted that if his brother hadn't maimed him he'd be quite handsome.

"Thank you," Sansa finally said, for lack of any other words. He jerked his head, so she spun around and started moving again. 

 

After another tortuous day at court, Sansa found some peace in the repetitive motions of her needle, her shadow ever present. "Do you have a favorite color?" Sansa asked. He was leaning against the wall opposite her while she sewed.

"Blue," he said reluctantly, as if the answer cost him. She nodded. Simple questions were the only ones he ever responded to, so that's how they passed the time. His answers were brusque, yet she always felt comforted, and triumphant even, knowing just a small detail about her companion. Sansa often thought about how it was probably extremely dull for him, just watching her walk in the gardens or read a book, or in this case, embroider a scrap of cloth.

"Do you prefer night or day?" Sansa asked.

He shrugged and shifted on his feet. "Day."

"Why?" Sansa asked, genuinely puzzled. Night was the only time he was free to do as he pleased, not trail a girl he so obviously detested. It was shocking that he’d ever given answers in the first place.

"Why does it matter?" he growled, defensive.

"Okay," Sansa said slowly. "If you knew you were going to die tomorrow, would you be disappointed that this is how you spent your last day?"

"No," he said, like a far-off thing. She tilted her head to the side and looked up at him.

"Why not?" Sansa asked curiously.

"It's as good a day as any," he said. "Much better than some." Sansa wondered if something spectacular happened on the way to her room.

"Don’t you get bored following me every day?" Sansa asked.

He looked ahead, avoiding her stare. Finally, he said, "You ask a lot of questions. I thought little birds only repeated pretty lines."

"I'm trying to entertain you. And myself." she told him. "But apparently that's unnecessary."

"Is that what they teach you?” The Hound snarled. His burnt flesh rippled and flashed a mean pink. “To entertain? To please? You aren’t supposed to please me. You shouldn’t be asking childish questions when you don’t want to know the answers.” Sansa felt hot tears spring to her eyes, shocked by how easily they came. 

“Maybe I do want to know the answers,” Sansa told him. “Did you ever think of that?” She took a deep breath, and said much softer, “Maybe I wanted a friend.” No words were exchanged after that, not a single cutting remark from him. Sansa let the half-finished cloth slip from her fingers onto the ground, and stood. She hurried down stone halls back to her rooms, not waiting for him to follow.

His hand nearly rose after her before he closed it to a fist and dropped it at his side when he realized he wanted to wipe away the tears he caused. Sandor Clegane pocketed the unfinished cloth and walked in the opposite direction.

 

Sansa decided that he was right—no conversation was necessary. She tossed aside the courtesies he despised so much and refused to offer anything beyond a civil greeting, not that he asked for anything more. As far as she knew, he felt the same sanctuary in silence as she. Days passed.

Finally, in the gardens on a late afternoon one week later, it was broken.

 

"Has the little bird run out of songs?" He sounded tired. Sansa paused to inspect a delicate pink blossom, and moves on without a reply. He waited, then sighed.

"I... am sorry," he muttered, strained, a near-foreign phrase strangled on his lips. Sansa turned slowly.

"What did you say?" Sansa asked softly, in utter disbelief at its reappearance.

She waited.

He said nothing.

Sansa watched him carefully, and bit a rosy lip. "Why is blue your favorite color?" The question was tentative, yet demanding. Sandor Clegane seemed a broken, reborn man when there came an openness to his face that never graced it before.

"Your eyes."

"Why do you like daytime?" Sansa asked, heart pounding.

"I'm not alone."

"Why wouldn't you mind dying, on that day?" Sansa asked breathlessly, hopefully.

"I was with you," he rasped, like sand on soft skin, like whiskers around a kiss  

"Why are you not bored with me?" Sansa's voice wavered.

Sandor looked into her eyes, bright and blue as the summer sea. She met his, unblinking. He seemed to realize that she was looking at the scarred side of his face, fearless. 

"You are brave," he said, like a thought that had always lived just on his tongue. He did not continue.

  
She knew then that he didn’t need to.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sansa has a dream and Sandor gets poetic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I managed to whip this out earlier than expected, and at the cost of a good night's sleep. Hopefully it satisfies your Sansan needs.

To answer her questions was maddening. To remain silent had been much worse.

For so long his gaze had followed the gentle sway of her willowy figure. For so long his mind had been comparing her eyes to the sky, the ocean, ice. For so long his thoughts had been dedicated to the way her hair flashed in the sun. So long, so long.

Sandor Clegane discovered that through all of the pain and rage inside him, there lived a thing called love.

Every day spent in her company had to have been some cruel fantasy, some vivid farce. Just the way she would hum to herself as she sewed made his heart soar like a child. And the day she met his eyes with no fear he had wanted to weep, or kiss her, or sing, or scream;  _Hate me, fear me, love me._

 

“Do you remember your dreams in the morning?” Sansa asked one late afternoon, standing among almost blindingly bright daffodils. She was still very fond of those little questions. _Why?_ He still wondered.

“Not often,” he told her. The ones he did recall were of fire; some nights the kind that filled him with terror, others the kind in her hair.  She nodded thoughtfully and ran the tip of her finger along a petal. The movement of her head caused those autumn curls of hers to stir, falling over the shoulder of a dress the color of the darkening sky.

“I dreamt of you,” she said in a murmur made for lullabies. The flowers paled in comparison to the smile playing across her lips. She selected one and stepped forward. “I gave you a flower, and touched your cheek.”

Sansa pressed the bloom into his palm, and then her hand was resting lightly on the left side of his face. Her found himself leaning into her touch, closing his eyes.

“And then?” Sandor hardly dared to breath, believing that at any moment the little bird would take flight.

Sansa sighed, a wistful sound. “And then I woke up.” As quickly as it came, the moment ended.

His eyes snapped open and he caught her wrist—gently, unlike all those times he’d done it before. When she couldn’t bear to look at him, when his very presence only brought fear and revulsion with good reason.

The softest gasp escaped her when he pulled her closer, laid it over his heart. _Do you know it belongs to you?_ he wanted to ask, one among countless questions of his own that he couldn’t find the words for. Sandor thought, not for the first time, that she possessed more courage than he ever would. _You are too good for me, too lovely, too pure. Why don't you run?_

Sansa slid her free hand to his shoulder and tilted her chin up, so close that he could feel her breath ghost across his face. His arm found her waist, brought her against him. Sansa rose on her toes, and their lips met. Just a touch, and she pulled away ever so slightly, looking through her eyelashes and watching him carefully. In that moment he felt whole and hers and home all at once, and Sansa smiled like she knew just that, and they came together again.

She was soft and sweet and it was almost chaste save the way her chest was pressed into his, the way her fingers gripped his hair. He caught her bottom lip between his and he never wanted it to end just by the sound that came fluttering from her throat. Sansa's arms draped behind his neck as if it belonged there and he wrapped his own around her as she parted her lips.

He was alive, and he wanted her everything and needed nothing save this. Oh, how her warmth felt on him, how she gave off a perfume more intoxicating than any summerwine. Sansa pulled away once more and he caught the breath he didn't know she took. She rested her head over his thudding heart, and he buried his face in the hair that put the sunset to shame.

  

They walked slowly down the hallway, and like every night he dreaded the moment she closed her door. Upon reaching it, Sansa pressed a lingering kiss to his scarred cheek. As she disappeared from sight, he knew that there were no words necessary when the silence was so eloquent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm aiming for short and sweet here. I believe this concludes my story, but I'll get around to posting new Sansan eventually.


End file.
